PLANT MIGHT NEED NEW GENERATORS

The operator of the troubled San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station warned Tuesday that the plant might not be able to return to full power without again replacing steam generators.

Edison International CEO Ted Craver said in a conference call with analysts that the company was looking at “what repairs if any could allow the steam generators to operate safely at full power.”

“At this time (Southern California Edison) has not determined what those repairs might be or whether the generators will need to be replaced for the units to operate at full output,” he said.

The recent replacement of the generators, whose tubing has rapidly deteriorated, ran at least $670 million.

Estimated costs of the six-month outage at the seaside plant in northern San Diego County continue to mount. Replacement power costs reached $117 million at the end of June.

Edison’s portion of inspections and repairs increased by $19 million in the second quarter to $48 million. The company has attempted to offset expenses with savings on operations and maintenance during the outage.

Southern California Edison wants to restart the northern Unit 2 reactor, which shows less extensive tube damage, at reduced power. Edison estimates that will cost $25 million. However, the company does not have approval from federal safety regulators and has yet to submit a restart plan.

No decision has been made by regulators on how much Edison can recover from its customers. The California Public Utilities Commission will eventually decide what can be passed on to ratepayers.

That process begins Thursday, when the commission considers whether to open an investigation into the outage.

The seaside installation in northern San Diego County has been offline since Jan. 31 when a steam generator tube leak resulted in a small radiation release. Further inspections uncovered unprecedented degradation of tubing within generators that were replaced starting in 2009 at a cost of at least $670 million.

San Diego Gas & Electric owns a 20 percent stake in the plant; the city of Riverside owns less than 2 percent.

Operating at full capacity, the plan once generated enough electricity to power up to 1.4 million homes.

Asked whether fixing the plant continues to be worthwhile, Edison’s Craver said that “all options are on the table.”

Inspections and analysis by federal nuclear safety regulators found the rapid wear on steam generator tubing was the consequence of faulty computer modeling that underestimated steam velocities by a factor of three or four, along with manufacturing issues that are still being investigated.

Edison also announced Tuesday that it is pursuing an insurance claim through the Nuclear Electric Insurance Limited, a mutual insurance company owned by entities across the nation with nuclear facilities, under a complex scheme of guarantees and conditions.

A purchase agreement with generator manufacturer Mitsubishi Heavy Industries limits its liability to $137 million and excludes “consequential” damages like replacement power costs, Edison reported.

Edison recently submitted tentative restart dates strictly as a formality — for November and December — with California’s main grid operator.